REDUCTIONS IN CASINOS

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[03:54 pm] 09 February, 2009

Starting from February 1 casino owners have to pay 125 thousand drams
for a game machine but the state budget doesn’t benefit from it. Casino
owners say if once they had about 20 playing machines and paid 75 00
drams for each, today the number of machines has reduced because of
the recent tax boost, hence the budget entries remain the same.

"The only "plus" is that more and more people are made redundant,"
said a casino owner. He says he used to have 20 playing machines and
kept six employees-three dealers and three security officers. Today
he has cut down the staff and keeps only one dealer.

The tax policy is simply unprofitable. They make us sell everything
and invest money overseas," said the casino owner.

"I worked in a casino in the outskirts of Yerevan. I got a salary
of 150000-180 000 drams and kept two families at a time. I was
sacked though it was the owner’s fault. After the tax amendments the
casino owner sold the playing machines and I was made redundant,"
says Karen. He tried to find a job in other casinos but wherever he
went he was told the same thing: "We can hardly keep our employees."

It is due to mention that casino goers have become fewer these
days. "We had clients who visited our casino every day. But recently
we haven’t seen them. On the whole, few people visit casinos. This
is probably resulted by the financial crisis," said a casino employee.